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One

Claire stared at the creaking billboard that ht, I ought to be crying Her best friend, Eve, already was, in helpless, furious sobs Claire held on to her and did all the syht— ed her

But although she said all the right things, she feltempty

Dry as the sand that blew through the desert outside the police cruiser’s s They were sitting in the backseat, behind steel mesh, and the doors wouldn’t open from the inside It was made like a taxi, but it most definitely wasn’t since it took you only where you didn’t want to go Namely, to jail

And across from where their cruiser was parked, four li loaded into two of the town’s aurneys, in case the wood still buried in their hearts to keep them temporarily dead didn’t work

Claire identified the slack faces as they were rolled by: Oliver, once town Founder Araced and in exile Jesse, the vamp who Claire knew the least well, a beautiful woile now, robbed (temporarily, hopefully) of her vampire life Then Myrnin, Claire’s bipolar vampire boss and friend, his dark hair an untamed mess around his still, white face

Finally, and most horribly, Michael Glass, Claire’s friend and the love of Eve’s life His skin had turned the color of pure white marble, and his blue eyes were open and dull He looked deadest of them all

“It’s fine,” Claire whispered,sure to keep Eve’s face turned away as Michael’s body was rolled past “Va as the arrows co Just breathe, okay? Breathe” It wasn’t soas the fact that her voice was steady and cal ocean of chaos

Eve took a deep breath, and her sobbing slowed and hitched to a stop She sat back as the a vehicles pulled away onto the two- lane blacktop heading toward don Morganville— if Morgan- ville had anything that could be described as a don She wiped her eyes on the back of her hand, slitter of her ruby wedding ring caught the light, and for a moment Claire’s wall of numbness shuddered and threatened to collapse to reveal the pain and fear she’d hidden behind it “Did you see Michael?” Eve asked She caught her breath on another sob, and her reddened eyes held Claire’s “Did he look okay?”

Claire couldn’t say that, because the sight of his icy skin and blank eyes had thoroughly unnerved her “He’ll be fine You know he’s tougher than this,” she said Which was a totally true thing, and beyond any argument

“I know— God, why did this happen? What do they want from us?”

Eve said it as a rhetorical wail, but it was the question that churned in Claire’s anville to warn As, not the least of which was the deadly growth of an anti- vaht Foundation— and the fact that one of Aents, Dr Irene Anderson (once of Mor- ganville), had joined the other side

But they’d been met by the local police instead of Aone downhill from there The cops had first separated out the humans— Claire, Eve, and Claire’s boyfriend, Shane, plus the prisoner, Dr Anderson Then, without any warn- ing, they’d taken down their vampire friends, who had just been wheeled into the ambulances and driven off to fates unknown

Claire twisted in the seat to look into the car behind them

The cops hadn’t had an easy ti Shane into the other cruiser; they’d ended up handcuffing hi He sat stiffly in the backseat, staring holes into the distance as if it were in for a beating Next to hih she didn’t care whose prisoner she was anymore

Claire knehy they’d separated her froht now, but she wanted desperately to be with hi in her mind Why would Hannah Moses do this? After all, Police Chief Moses was their ally, their good and trusted friend But she’d shown no hesitation, no re-morse The only way to interpret what had just happened was that Hannah had freely and willingly joined the Daylight Foundation

Nothing wasany sense, and Claire needed it to anvil e, Hannah had told her, as their friends— theirquarantined for their own protection

It couldn’t be true It justcouldn’t And yet it so obviously was

“Where are they taking hihts of the departing a about quarantine What does thatthem to the hospital? Do they think they have some kind of dis- ease?”